Marxism: 2008 Archives

Mainstream media and columnists have been singularly uninterested in Obama's philosophy and his immersion in Marxist studies and activities. Saul Alinsky, the founder of community organizing, was a hero to Obama and he studied his methods carefully and extensively. Alinksy wanted to overthrow capitalism and establish a totalitarian Marxist socialist (or communist) system in America. The signs are that Obama wants that, too.

Fortunately for us, British writer Melanie Phillips is paying attention even if no one in the American media is. Today she notes the first Alinsky-style steps Obama is taking to mobilize his 13 million email correspondents to help push through his programs.

Obama in a careless recorded moment in 2001 revealed his dissatisfaction with the U.S. Constitution. Its focus was on freedom of opportunity, whereas Obama wants the government to use its power for "redistributive change." He said he didn't think the Supreme Court, no matter how left wing, would be able to accomplish that, so Phillips believes he's aiming to undermine the values of the Constitution at street level.

[C]ommunity organising’ is straight out of the Alinsky/ Gramsci Marxist playbook – a means of radicalising the proletariat so that it takes power and overturns the values of the society. Instead of the Founding Fathers and the Supreme Court, America is about to get a new constitution written by the thugs of ACORN.

Obama learned the value of ACORN in the early 1990s when he worked with them on voter registration. More important, he taught ACORN operatives how to harass and intimidate bankers into making mortgage loans to people who couldn't afford them. Obama literally planted the seeds that led to today's subprime mortgage loan crisis, world credit breakdown, the collapse of the markets and the loss of hundreds of billions in savings.

In his presidential compaign, Obama used ACORN for voter registration and employed Alinksy techniques, especially rhetorically, with his calls of "hope' and "change," never identifying what change he wanted. Start with a dissastified group (ready made from the financial collapse), proceed with calm and quiet deception on the way to exciting the masses into a frenzy of demand.

Alinsky, who believed that the revolution had to be carried out through stealth and deception with its proponents cultivating an image of centrism and pragmatism, set out in Rules for Radicals how capitalism would be overthrown by the mobilisation of the masses and the whipping up of their discontent.

Those who are lulled by the centrist defense and economic appointments have no idea of the radical redistributive changes Obama intends to ram through Congress and the media with the aid of his millions of community organizers. As Phillips observes, all those exhibiting the muscle at most represent the 54% who voted for Obama and not at all the 47% who did not, who will have no say. Indeed, since so many of the 54% were totally oblivious to or ignorant of Obama's radical past and demonstrated inclinations it is a fair assumption that they will be as astonished and dismayed at what is being foisted on them as the 47%.

The American system has produced the greatest prosperity the world has ever seen and an America of unparalleled economic strength. This is what Obama, by his past words and actions, seems bent on destroying and replacing with his socialist utopia. He's wasting no time in getting ready.

Phillips is open in her grave concern about an Obama presidency:

As history tells us, sometimes democratic elections bring to power a leader who threatens freedom. This is just such a moment.

Her fear-tinged observation:

December 9, 2008

Ruling by a Radical
Melanie Phillips

At the end of October, I wrote here about the interview Barack Obama gave back in 2001 in which he said the American Constitution was flawed because it only provided for “negative liberty” – which I suggest is what genuine freedom consists of – as opposed to what the state should do for individuals, or “positive rights” as this is known, which I suggest amounts to state control of individual behaviour. He regretted the fact that the civil rights movement had

a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change.

I commented that, since Obama recognised that the Supreme Court was unlikely to redraft the constitution, his stated aim was to bring about some kind of undermining of its values at street level:

As has been pointed out on this blog and in numerous investigations published on the net, ‘community organising’ is straight out of the Alinsky/ Gramsci Marxist playbook – a means of radicalising the proletariat so that it takes power and overturns the values of the society. Instead of the Founding Fathers and the Supreme Court, America is about to get a new constitution written by the thugs of ACORN.

Alinsky was the Marxist thinker who preached cultural revolution from the grass roots up through community organisation, and whose thinking permeates ACORN and other community groups that in the past were associated with or funded by Obama – now the nation’s First Community Organiser. Now look at the latest email Camp Obama has sent to the 13 million-plus names on its database of supporters:

Exactly one month ago, you made history by giving all Americans a real opportunity for change. Now it's time to start preparing and working for change in our communities. On December 13th and 14th, supporters are coming together in every part of the country to reflect on what we've accomplished and plan the future of this movement. Your ideas and feedback will be collected and used to guide this movement in the months and years ahead. Join your friends and neighbors – sign up to host or attend a Change is Coming house meeting near you.Since the election, the challenges we face -- and our responsibility to take action – have only gotten more urgent.

You can connect with fellow supporters, make progress on the issues you care about, and help shape the future of your community and our country.Learn what you can do now to support President-elect Obama's agenda for change and continue to make a difference in your community. Take the first important step by hosting or attending a Change is Coming house meeting. Sign up right now: http://my.barackobama.com/changeiscoming

To get our country back on track, it will take all of us working together. Barack and Joe have a clear agenda and an unprecedented opportunity for change. But they can't do it alone. Will you join us at a house meeting and help plan the next steps for this movement?

And at the Change is Coming website itself, we learn:

As President, Barack Obama is counting on you to organize in your neighborhood and continue this movement. This guide will provide you with all the tools and resources you need to host a successful Change Is Coming house meeting. At your event you will:

• Get to know others in your area who are ready to work for change.
• Determine the issues most important to your group.
• Plan how you can reach out to your local representatives and media to ensure your voices are heard.
• Get started bringing change right away by planning a service event before the Inauguration.

It is up to each one of us to take the fate of our country into our hands. Use this guide to start planning your own Change is Coming event.

Alinsky, who believed that the revolution had to be carried out through stealth and deception with its proponents cultivating an image of centrism and pragmatism, set out in Rules for Radicals how capitalism would be overthrown by the mobilisation of the masses and the whipping up of their discontent. As I noted here, the strategy revolved around creating apparently moderate local organisations that would be manipulated by community organisers – effectively deniable political agitators -- to foment grievance and dissent.

Apparently oblivious – like so many – to the implications of all this, the Washington Post has told us breathlessly that health policy is to be shaped by harnessing the campaign supporters’ database – despite a few, er, legal pitfalls.

“This is the beginning of the reinvention of what the presidency in the 21st century could be,’ said Simon Rosenberg, president of the center-left think tank NDN. ‘This will reinvent the relationship of the president to the American people in a way we probably haven't seen since FDR’s use of radio in the 1930s.”

Since those whose input is to be tapped, however, are Obama’s supporters, this “reinvention of the relationship to the American people” will effectively exclude from helping shape the policy of their country the 47 per cent of the people of that country who did not vote for Obama.

A couple of other stories have started waking up to this. Bloomberg has noted that the email list would also give Obama the ability to pressurise Congress.

“When President Obama says, "21 members of Congress are standing in the way of my health plan", one out of 10 voting Americans start to go to work on those members of Congress', said Democratic consultant Joe Trippi, who ran Howard Dean's 2004 presidential campaign, the first to make widespread use of the Internet to raise money and organize supporters.

It’s called Ruling by a Radical.

Warning: If you click though to the publication where the article appears and click on the link in the Obama letter to his 13 million email army that says "Sign up right now," you will get caught in installing a special Obama network on your computer. Don't.

As we've reported on several occasions, communist (Marxist socialist, if you prefer) Saul Alinsky was the founder of the community organizer movement and was and is Obama's hero. (Alinsky's hero was Lucifer, who defied God and got a kingdom of his own to run.)

Alinsky wanted to "transform" America into a socialist state. First, dissastifaction and resentment had to be stirred in the masses. Then they were to be encouraged, that there was "hope" and 'change" could come. Never was it to be disclosed exactly what change would be coming; that might kill the enthusiasm for change. Class envy and resentment were of course important parts of stirring up the anger of the crowds; whatever was going wrong, it was "their" fault.

Obama steeped himself in Alinsky studies and practiced Alinsky methods as a community organizer in Chicago. He then taught classes in Alinsky socialist manipulation to ACORN operatives and others -- how to register voters, how to bully bankers. Organize the massses to prepare to bring the American system down. For the socialist state to function at its best, it should be authoritarian or totalitarian as much as possible, bending the U.S. Constitution as much as it can be bent. Critics should be harassed into silence. Power to the crush all opposition is imperative. But don't say so. Just do it.

Now that Obama will be taking over the White House on January 20th some in the media are beginning to take a look at who will be joining him.

Saul Alinsky Takes the White House

By Quin Hillyer on 11.6.08

Daniel Henninger also takes note of Obama's constant habit of dissing the United States. Even in his victory speech he sounded as if the U.S. should be torn apart and rebuilt brick by brick. In fact, he actually said that.

Obama was announcing he fully intends to implement his Marxist socialist vision for America. The team he will assemble will be the one he believes is best able to help him create the utopia (if the Constitution will only let him do it) envisioned by his Marxist hero Saul Alinsky, in which all share equally in whatever the unproductive can tear from the productive, who, of course, will stop being productive.

Here's Henniger's take.

You don't want to be depressed, but it's instructive to watch this video. One can question the future of democracy. The folks at Power Line have made a very good point.

The top 10% of American earners pay a higher percentage of taxes than in any other developed country in the world, including the usual example of extreme socialist Sweden. And Obama is going to stick it to that 10% even more so he can spread the wealth to those he thinks "deserve it." And those who "deserve it," like the starstruck lady in this video, are delerious about not having anymore to pay for their mortgage or their gas.

As we get closer to the election, we might as well read in full what people of sanity are saying.

This report of the disgusting as if not illegal (dereliction of official duty) in Ohio is breathtaking. See if you agree. And how about Missouri? And trampling over Joe the Plumber?

Does anyone want the Peolosi-Obama-Reid troika telling you what to do and how much to pony up? It's spread the wealth with your money by upping your tax to those waiting with their hands out.

In a 2001 radio interview in which Obama again expressed belief in the "redistribution of wealth," the Illinois senator regretted that the Supreme Court "didn't break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution." Will Obama, through his appointments to the court, remove those constraints? Is "Joe" only the first on an Obama's enemies list?

Obama's Plumbers

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Thursday, October 30, 2008

Election '08: Ohio Democrats refused to act on ACORN's massive vote fraud. Yet they have time to scour the private records of Joe the Plumber. No wonder Barack Obama finds the Constitution an inconvenience.

Joe Wurzelbacher (also known as Joe the Plumber) has learned there's a price to pay for being the one to get Obama to admit that he has a socialist dream to "spread the wealth." Not only are you thrust into the public eye, you get the privilege of having government officials who support Obama rifle through private files looking for dirt on you.

Helen Jones-Kelley, director of the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services and a maxed-out contributor to the Obama campaign, has confirmed that she approved the check on Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher after the Oct. 15 presidential debate.

Jones-Kelley explained her governmental prying by saying, "Our practice is when someone is thrust quickly into the public spotlight, we often take a look" at them. For example, she cited the case of a lottery winner who was found to owe back child support. But Wurzelbacher didn't win the lottery; he merely asked how much more of his hard-earned money was going to be taxed away under the Obama plan.

According to the Columbus-Dispatch, at least four state computer checks on Wurzelbacher were conducted shortly after Republican John McCain frequently brought up "Joe the Plumber" during the final presidential debate. In addition to the Department of Job and Family Services, driver's license and vehicle registration information on "Joe" was pulled from Bureau of Motor Vehicles computers. BMV information on Wurzelbacher also was obtained through accounts assigned to the Cuyahoga County Child Support Enforcement Agency and the Toledo Police Department.

In a 2001 radio interview in which Obama again expressed belief in the "redistribution of wealth," the Illinois senator regretted that the Supreme Court "didn't break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution." Will Obama, through his appointments to the court, remove those constraints? Is "Joe" only the first on an Obama's enemies list?

Contrast this investigative frenzy with the refusal of Ohio's Democratic Secretary of State, Jennifer Bruner, to use government records to check the thousands of new voters registered by ACORN and others for registration fraud. She also refused notify local election officials when fraud was discovered.

This isn't the first time team Obama has sought to stifle dissent, threatening to use the powers of government to intimidate and punish its opponents. A recent report on KMOV-TV in St. Louis said:

"The Barack Obama campaign is asking Missouri law enforcement to target anyone who lies or runs a misleading TV ad during the presidential campaign."

The Obama campaign will target anyone who says this emperor has no clothes. It wasn't long ago that a team of 30 lawyers, investigators and Democratic party operatives trekked up to Alaska to find dirt on Sarah Palin. Now they're after Joe the Plumber.

Should Obama, Sen. Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi gain unfettered control of the powers of government and the Supreme Court and reinstate the so-called Fairness Doctrine, they might come after you.

Suddenly it's dawning on people that Obama's community organizer days of learning, absorbing and practicing the lessons of the Marxist socialist (communist) Saul Alinksy are now being played out for real in this presidential race. Obama has honed the skills of agitation, making people angry and resentful and focusing their anger at the "rich," classic class warfare. And the soaring rhetoric learned in the pews of Jeremiah Wright's church against those who oppress accompanied by promises to those who rise up that there will be at last "hope" and "change" has memerized many.

It's the smooth version of the messages of hate that have emanated from Jeremiah Wright, Michael Pfleger, Louis Farrakhan and William Ayers that America is bad and must be changed. To what?

Tony Blankley examines the hypnotic effect of the Alinsky method:

Obama's early mentor in the Alinsky method of social agitation was Mike Kruglik, whom Lizza paraphrased as saying: "(Obama) was a natural, the undisputed master of agitation, who could engage a room full of recruiting targets in a rapid-fire Socratic dialogue, nudging them to admit that they were not living up to their own standards. As with the panhandler, he could be aggressive and confrontational. With probing, sometimes personal questions, he would pinpoint the source of pain in their lives, tearing down their egos just enough before dangling a carrot of hope that they could make things better."

As Kyle-Anne Shiver in the American Thinker explained after quoting those words: "The agitator's job, according to Alinsky, is first to bring folks to the 'realization' that they are indeed miserable, that their misery is the fault of unresponsive governments or greedy corporations, then help them to bond together to demand what they deserve, and to make such an almighty stink that the dastardly governments and corporations will see imminent 'self-interest' in granting whatever it is that will cause the harassment to cease.

"In these methods, euphemistically labeled 'community organizing,' Obama had a four-year education, which he often says was the best education he ever got anywhere."

And in the big picture, how does Obama see America under the U.S. Constitution?

And now we have Obama's genuinely shocking words from a 2001 National Public Radio interview: "But the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and more basic issues of political and economic justice in this society. And to that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren court, it wasn't that radical.

It didn't break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution, at least as it's been interpreted, and the Warren court interpreted it in the same way that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. . And one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was -- because the civil rights movement became so court-focused, I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change. . The Constitution reflected an enormous blind spot in this culture that carries on until this day. . The Framers had that same blind spot . the fundamental flaw of this country."

Obama's sees the Constitution as fundamentally flawed. Its protection of individual liberty and property from the power of the government is a fundamental flaw in Obama's eyes. He wants "change." He wants judges who will deliver him that "change," even if it means throwing off the "essential constraints" on government power the Founding Fathers put in the Constitution. What will his government do with that power?

We live in dangerous days. The world economy teeters on the edge of the abyss. The exiting American president is a failed thing. An envious world smells a momentarily vulnerable America. The political beneficiary of Republican failure believes our Constitution is fatally flawed. He may be a committed Marxist. And if he held the presidency for four years, it would be the longest stretch that he ever held a full-time job. God Save the Republic. (emphasis added)